Director-General, World Health Organisation (WHO), Dr Tedros Ghebreyesus, has arrived Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo), to assess the needs of Ebola response first-hand.
Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director General of the World Health Organisation (WHO). Photo credit: FABRICE COFFRINI/AFP/Getty Images
The director general announced this on his Twitter handle @DrTedros on Sunday, May 13, 2018.
He said WHO staffers were in the team that first identified the outbreak, adding that the organisation was working with its partners to send more staff, equipment and supplies to the area.
Ghebreyesus said that the organisation and its partners were also working with national health authorities to contain the Ebola outbreak in DR Congo.
He reassured that the organisation and its partners were committed to the continuous action to beat Ebola.
According to him, as of May 11, “our case count is two confirmed cases, 12 suspected cases and 18 probable cases.”
He added: “I just arrived in Kinshasa, DR Congo with the Regional Director for Africa, Dr Moeti Matshidiso, and the WHO Deputy Director-General, Emergency Preparedness and Response, Dr Pete Salama.
“We have been briefed about current situations and WHO and partners are committed to continuing swift actions to beat Ebola,’’ Ghebreyesus said.
The organisation, also on its Twitter handle @WHO, said that mobile laboratory materials have been shipped to strengthen the rapid analysis of samples from Bikoro, the Ebola-affected area in DR Congo.
WHO had on Thursday, May 10 announced that it released $1 million from its contingency fund for emergencies to support the rapid response to the outbreak in the country.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the outbreak was first confirmed by the organisation on May 8 with the two cases occurring at Bikoro health zone, Equateur province.
WHO says it has alerted countries surrounding DR Congo about the outbreak to enable them to take precautionary measures to prevent spread.
Heavy rains in Somalia’s Juba and Shabelle river basins continue to cause flash and riverine flooding displacing an estimated 220,000 people, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said on Friday, May 11, 2018.
Victims of flooding in Somalia
Jens Laerke, Deputy spokesperson for OCHA, said at a regular UN briefing that a total of 718,000 people have been affected by the floods in the northeast African region that have claimed 132 lives in Kenya.
“Humanitarian partners and Somali authorities are providing life-saving assistance, logistical support to move people to higher grounds, and distributing sandbags to repair river breakages,” said Laerke.
In Ethiopia, flash floods are expected to continue in flood-prone areas.
In April alone, nearly 171,000 people were displaced across the country, the majority by flooding in Somali region.
Floods have also destroyed some 13,000 hectares of farmland and damaged health facilities and schools.
The government in Ethiopia and partners are dispatching emergency relief including safe drinking water and hygiene and sanitation relief which are crucial to avoid a reemergence of acute watery diarrhea.
In Kenya, more than 311,000 people have been displaced by floods and the death toll has risen to 132, including some 30 people, who were killed in Nakuru, when a dam bursts its banks on May 9.
“The government and partners, in particular, the Kenyan Red Cross, are responding including with search and rescue of people marooned by floods,” said Laerke.
The potential for the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) to become a powerful tool for driving industrialisation, economic diversification and development has been highlighted at the start of the UN Economic Commission for Africa’s (ECA) Conference of Ministers in Addis Ababa (Ethiopia). The four-day event, holding from May 11 to 15, aims to advance the ambitious initiative to form a regional common market which the ECA believes could boost intra-African trade from its current level of 16% to 52% by 2022.
Delegates at the conference
Addressing the gathering, Vera Songwe, Executive Secretary of the ECA, stated that realising the promise of the AfCFTA and its development goals required the continent to take “bold actions” on many fronts.
She told the 51st session of the Conference of Ministers: “Now we must seize the momentum at hand, to focus on how to operationalise the agreement in a manner that realises its potential to the benefit of the average African.”
The Executive Secretary also observed the most important and urgent action is to create the ‘fiscal space’ to foster public and private investment, while ensuring economic diversification with the view to creating jobs.
Her address also acknowledged concerns that the AfCTA may cause tariff revenues losses leading to ‘holes’ in national budgets. The AFCFTA’s impact upon taxes applied to imported and exported goods, however, would be “small and gradual”,’ according to the Executive Secretary, who explained: “These tariff revenue losses may be outweighed by the additional revenues from growth to be generated by AfCFTA.”
Africa’s governments were also urged to take a broader review of macroeconomic policies, especially fiscal measures, in order to ensure they are ‘fit for purpose’ to make the most of the AfCFTA.
Vera Songwe remarked: “We need to improve our levels of fiscal space. This includes boosting tax revenues, improving the efficiency of public expenditure management, tackling illicit financial flows and making use of private finance for public projects.”
This year’s conference follows the signing of the AfCFTA by 44 countries earlier this year, while a total of 50 signed either the agreement or the Kigali declaration underscoring their commitment to the visionary, pan-African project. On Thursday, May 11, Kenya and Ghana handed over to the African Union Commission the documents ratifying the continental free trade, becoming the first two countries to do so.
In addition to the ministerial proceedings, expert sessions and parallel side events will address the conference theme: “Creating fiscal space for jobs and economic diversification”. These will highlight the importance of accompanying taxation measures to support and fully take advantage of the AfCFTA while also strengthening fiscal sustainability in Africa. Other topics include agriculture’s role in economic growth; financing infrastructure; tackling illicit financial flows; and an integrated strategy for the Sahel.
There will also be the launch of the 5th African Governance Report; the Global Education Monitoring Report; and the 2018 Assessing Regional Integration Report. The ECA’s annual Adebayo Adedeji Lecture (named in honour of the body’s longest-serving executive secretary that passed away in April) will be given by Prof. Mary Teuw Niane, Senegal’s Minister of Higher Education, Scientific Research and Innovation. It will pay also tribute to Prof. Calestous Juma, a renowned supporter of harnessing innovation and technology to advance Africa’s development, who died last month.
A dam project that was abandoned 37 years ago may be resurrected in the bid to provide succour to a thirsty neighbourhood in Borno State.
Senator Ali Ndume
Senator Ali Ndume (APC, Borno South) has appealed to the Federal Government to complete the Biu Dam project to address water scarcity in the area.
Ndume made the appeal in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Sunday, May 13, 2018 in Maiduguri, the state capital.
Ndume said that more than 200,000 people of the zone lacked access to portable water which is gradually crippling socio-economic activities of the area.
He explained that the first phase of the project was awarded to LeeFakino in 1979 and re-awarded to Nalando Company recently but had remained abandoned.
He claimed that although the state government had paid its counterpart fund for the completion of the dam, the Federal Government was yet to release its share for the continuation of the project.
He added that the dam, when completed, would assist in tackling the problem of water shortage as well as provide water for irrigation.
“The government should also look into the possibility of relocating IDPs from communities that share border with Cameroon like Ngoshe, Ashgashiya, Kirawa.
“We are thinking that the pressure on Pulka, which houses six wards, is overstretched and one of the biggest challenges that the people are currently facing is lack of water.
“Pulka is currently housing about 65,000 IDPs from six wards in the villages in the mountains. Government as a matter of urgency must build temporary camps to decongest this over population.
“They should also construct artificial dams to enable IDPs that have returned to their communities like Gwoza, Limakara and Izge to go back to their farms.
“We are appealing to the African Development Bank (AfDB), World Bank as well as the UNDP to look into the possibility of completing the long awaited Biu Dam using its own resources,” he said.
An environmentalist, Mr Idowu Salawu, has called for establishment of a solar farm at the Olusosun Dumpsite in Lagos recently closed by the state government.
Capping at the Olusosun dumpsite in Lagos
Salau, Chief Executive Officer, Macpresse West Africa Ltd., made the call during a visit to the Lagos Office of the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN).
Salawu said that the proposal by the state government to convert the dumpsite to a recreation centre was below the economic potential of the landfill.
“Olusosun is a treasure to Lagos; it is located at the heart of Lagos and close to the national grid.
“It is a good development that the state government has decided to transform the dump site to a recreation centre, but the government should look beyond a park.
“I advise establishment of a value chain because of its strategically located; the Olusosun Dumpsite can generate 25 megawatts of electricity,’’ he said.
The expert said that the landfill could accommodate the solar farm, an energy-generating facility and a recreation park for economic viability.
“Scientific reports state that you can generate one megawatt of electricity from one million metric tonnes of landfill waste.
“Olusosun has been in existence since 1992; from estimates, it has received not less than 25 to 30 million metric tonnes of landfill waste that can produce 25 megawatts of electricity.
“It can also produce 325,000 cubic feet of gas, enough to power from 800kw to 1,000kw of electricity turbine plant.
“The state government can incorporate the solar farm, energy-generating facility and recreation park at the Olusosun site,” he said.
Salawu called for caution in the current capping of the landfill to avert disaster.
He called for a scientific approach to the capping.
“Landfill fires are very delicate; one method cannot be used to turn off the fire.
“It takes a multifaceted approach. We have the surface and the sub-surface landfill fire.
“I hope that the capping of the landfill is done appropriately so that it does not result in sub-surface fire.
“I advise that a post-closure study plan of the dump site be carried out before capping the landfill with laterite.”
“The expert added that there should also be a gas mapping study to locate the various kinds of gases beneath the surface.
“The capping should be done scientifically to get the best of it, in terms of economic viability,” he said.
Akinbode Oluwafemi, deputy director, Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the Earth Nigeria (ERA/FoEN), alleges that the visit of World Bank Executive Directors to the country is to promote privatisation, particular in the water sector. Under the aegis of the Our Water Our Right Coalition, he calls on the populace to resist the move
Akinbode Oluwafemi, Deputy Executive Director, Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the Earth Nigeria (ERA/FoEN)
We are concerned with the World Bank invasion of Nigeria and Lagos in particular. Earlier this week we received reports of World Bank Executives’ visit to the Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, and the Lagos State Governor, Akinwunmi Ambode, as part of a host of engagements supposedly to study the challenges and expectations of their partners in West Africa.
Ten executive directors of the bank from different countries came for this visit. They are from Switzerland, France, Italy, Nordic, Peru, Germany and South Africa (representing Angola, Nigeria and South Africa). Others are from Burkina Faso (representing Francophone sub-Saharan Africa), Zimbabwe (representing Anglophone sub-Saharan Africa), United Kingdom and Indonesia.
On Wednesday, May 9, 2018 when the team visited Governor Ambode, he is credited as saying that the various budget support initiatives of the bank in the water sector in Lagos had supposedly resulted in “stronger ties with the institution” and urged the bank to plough more funds into water and other key projects in the state.
The Ambode administration continues to present Lagos as a state ready for any form of private investment and water remains one of the sectors that it is pushing for investors to take control of.
This is very disturbing.
Since 2014 we have challenged attempts at the commodification of Lagos water by the Lagos State government through a Public Private Partnership (PPP) model now being vigorously pursued across the globe by the World Bank.
We unearthed the secret advisory contract between the World Bank’s private arm – International Finance Corporation (IFC) – and the Lagos government which the IFC walked away from due to popular resistance that we spearheaded along with our global partners in the struggle to keep our water from for-profit corporations.
We have shown through well-documented researches that the PPP and other privatisation models that the World Bank wants to foist on us through their heartless partners in government have failed in every continent that they were introduced. Water privatisation models promoted by the World Bank through its private arm – IFC failed in Beunos Aires, Cochabamba, Paris, Manila, Delhi, Tanzania, Cameroun, Ghana, and more recently in Gabon.
We had equally urged the Lagos State Government to invest some of the huge revenue it rakes in monthly in sustainably funding its water infrastructure, including rehabilitation of existing waterworks spread across the state.
World Bank behind the scenes
Beginning in 2017 the World Bank rolled out a vision to promote privatisation, leveraging on crowding in the private sector. Its priority now seems tailored to changing policies and regulations to promote private finance. This may have informed the decision of the Lagos government in February 2017 to introduce the comprehensive environment law which was laced with anti-people sections including the criminalisation of boreholes and wells to pave way for privatisers to take over the sector. Faulty argument of the Lagos government is that Lagos has the resource which is water, the people which it believes must pay, and so-called investors that it woos with promises of money to be made in the state water sector.
The Our Water Our Right Coalition had to organise public protests culminating in the march on Alausa secretariat in 2017 which forced the government to expunge the wicked sections from the law.
Unfortunately, it is still promoting the World Bank new approach which prescribes private investment for projects then PPP and only if the two fail will public finance be an option.
The visit of the huge number of World Bank executives to Nigeria and particularly Lagos may actually be a smokescreen because it was kept away from civil society and other critical stakeholders whom it fears will raise red flags. The visit may actually be a signal it wants to move forward with new projects in Lagos focusing on privatisation and PPP.
As we have said time and again, around the globe, the World Bank private arm – IFC has been advising governments, conducting corporate bidding processes, designing complex and lopsided water privatisation contracts, dictating arbitration terms, and is part-owner of water corporations that win the contracts it designs and recommends, all while aggressively marketing the PPP model to be replicated around the world.
Not only do we see these activities as undermining democratic water governance, they also constitute an inherent conflict of interest within the IFC’s activities in the water sector as has been observed from in different countries.
In Manila and Ghana World Bank corporate partners attempted to privatise and profit from water. Poor service, limited ace,ss and chronic quality problems forced the Ghanian government not to renew a bank-backed contract for a private corporation to manage the country’s water.
Despite its 60-day disclosure policy, the Lagos advisory contract which it walked away from after much pressure in 2015 was not disclosed on the bank’s website and was hidden from civil society.
We reiterate our NO to water privatisation
We believe that the visit of the World Bank team to Nigeria and particularly Lagos is a whitewash. As anticipated, critical stakeholders like civil society and the public have been kept in the dark on the critical reasons behind the visit and the banks’ poster projects.
The Our Water Our Right Coalition uses this medium to reiterate our call
No to the ongoing wholesale privatisation of Nigeria and privatisation of our water
The federal and state governments, particularly Lagos should reject contracts designed by, involving, or influenced by the IFC, which operates to maximise private profit, among others.
Lagos and other states of the federation can fund water sustainably if they build the political will to prioritise water for the people and come up with a comprehensive plan that invests in the water infrastructure necessary to provide universal water access, create jobs, and improve public health
Government at all levels must integrate broad public participation in developing plans to achieve universal access to clean water and uphold the human right to water as an obligation of the government, representing the people.
Visionscape Sanitation Solutions (VSS) has refuted claims that it is mentioned in the revised environmental laws of Lagos State.
Chief Executive Officer of Visionscape, Mr John Irvine
An online news medium had in a news report quoted an opposition politician in Lagos who claimed that Visionscape was included in the environmental laws of Lagos.
But, in a statement, Visionscape says it rejects the statement it describes as false.
“Visionscape Sanitations Solutions has learnt of the false report circulating in the media regarding the inclusion of its name/parent company name in the recently ratified Environmental Law of Lagos State.
“The above statement is false and the Visionscape Group and Visionscape Sanitation Solutions strongly reject this statement in its entirety.
“While Visionscape chooses not to engage routinely in reference to defamatory statements, the company has deemed it necessary to state unequivocally that neither Visionscape Group nor any of its subsidiaries had ever been written into or named in the laws of Lagos State or any other state in Nigeria. To allude to this implicitly or explicitly is mischievous and divisive,” it stated.
The renewable energy industry created more than 500,000 new jobs globally in 2017, a 5.3 per cent increase from 2016, according to figures released by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) on Tuesday, May 9, 2018.
Employment: Installation of solar panels
According to the fifth edition of Renewable Energy and Jobs – Annual Review, launched at IRENA’s 15th Council in Abu Dhabi, the UAE, the total number of people employed in the sector (including large hydropower) now stands at 10.3 million globally, surpassing the 10 million figure for the first time.
China, Brazil, the United States, India, Germany and Japan remain the world’s largest renewable energy employers, representing more than 70 per cent of all industry jobs globally. Although growing numbers of countries are reaping the socio-economic benefits of renewables, the bulk of manufacturing takes place in relatively few countries and domestic markets vary enormously in size. Sixty per cent of all renewable energy jobs are in Asia.
“Renewable energy has become a pillar of low-carbon economic growth for governments all over the world, a fact reflected by the growing number of jobs created in the sector.” said Adnan Z. Amin, Director-General of the International Renewable Energy Agency.
“The data also underscores an increasingly regionalised picture, highlighting that in countries where attractive policies exist, the economic, social and environmental benefits of renewable energy are most evident,” continued Mr. Amin. “Fundamentally, this data supports our analysis that decarbonisation of the global energy system can grow the global economy and create up to 28 million jobs in the sector by 2050.”
The solar PV industry remains the largest employer of all renewable energy technologies, accounting for close to 3.4 million jobs, up almost 9 per cent from 2016 following a record 94 gigawatts (GW) of installations in 2017. China was estimated to account for two-thirds of PV jobs – equivalent to 2.2 million – representing an expansion of 13 per cent over the previous year.
Despite a slight dip in Japan and the United States, the two countries followed China as the largest markets for solar PV employment in the world. India and Bangladesh complete a top five that accounts for around 90 per cent of global solar PV jobs.
Jobs in the wind industry contracted slightly last year to 1.15 million worldwide. While wind jobs are found in a relatively small number of countries, the degree of concentration is lower than in the solar PV sector. China accounts for 44 per cent of global wind employment, followed by Europe and North America with 30 and 10 per cent, respectively. Half of the top ten countries with the largest installed capacity of wind power in the world are European.
“The energy transformation is one of improving economic opportunity and a rise in social wellbeing as countries implement supportive policies and attractive regulatory frameworks to fuel industrial growth and sustainable job creation,” said Dr. Rabia Ferroukhi, Head of IRENA’s Policy Unit and Deputy Director of Knowledge, Policy and Finance.
“By providing policy makers with this level of detail about the composition of renewable energy employment and skills requirements, countries can make informed decisions on several important national objectives, from education and training, to industrial policies and labour market regulations,” continued Dr. Ferroukhi. “Such considerations will support a fair and equitable transition to a renewables based energy system.”
An environmentalist, Mr Paul Akporowho, on Thursday, May 10, 2018 called for stiffer measures to effectively address issues of gas flaring in the oil and gas sector.
Gas flaring in Ogoniland, Nigeria. Photo credit: premiumtimesng.com
Akporowho, who spoke with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Warri, called on the Federal Government to take decisive measures through viable legislations to nip the “illegalities” on the bud.
He said that the fall out of environmental pollution emanating from hydrocarbon emissions would persist until firm measures were taken to tackle the situation.
According to him, oil multinationals need to devise better means of evacuating their gas instead of flaring them into the atmosphere, thereby causing environmental and health hazards to people.
The environmentalist said that the hydrocarbon processing plants were heavy pollutants and needed to be regulated for a healthy environment.
“Only the Federal Government has the sole responsibility of monitoring and regulating the oil and gas industry.
“Recently, Port Harcourt was taken over by black sooth pollution and it is of a great concern, particularly to the people of the Niger Delta. There should be proper ways of evacuating gas.
“The development is capable of causing myriads of health problems including respiratory disease like asthma, cardiovascular disease and skin cancer,’’ the former National Secretary, Nigerian Environmental Society (NES), said.
Akporowho said: “It can also cause environmental damage to both the terrestrial and aquatic animals like fish, periwinkles and birds, among others, aside the peoples’ means of livelihood.
“The issue is not peculiar to Port Harcourt alone; we also have them in Warri where gasses are flared and illegal bunkering activities are perpetually carried out.
“So, Federal Government, being responsible for the monitoring and regulating the oil industry, needs to tackle these anomalies head-on through good legislation.”
A lecturer in the Department of Geography, Gombe State University, Mr Iliya Musa, says Nigerian farmers are more vulnerable to the consequences of climate change.
In northern Nigeria, farming faces challenges related to desertification and drought
Musa told News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on the sidelines of a media roundtable on climate change in Gombe, organised by Africa Media Development Foundation.
He said that Nigeria’s agricultural sector was very much threatened by the consequences of climate change, adding that the situation appeared grim as the sector gave employment to over 70 per cent of the country’s population.
He stressed that the consequences of climate change were a global phenomenon, adding, however, that all stakeholders in Nigeria, including government, citizens and organisations, should make concerted efforts to address climate change issues.
“Nigerian farmers are particularly vulnerable because a larger portion of the citizenry, that is 70 per cent of the population, is engaged in agriculture as their means of livelihood.
“These people are dependent on climate-sensitive natural resources for their livelihood and are, thus, more at risk of being affected by climate change.
“Already, temperature increase of about 0.2 degree Celsius to 0.3 degree Celsius per decade has occurred in the various ecological zones of the country, while persistent drought has characterised the southern Sudan-Sahel region since late 1960s.
“The Savannah areas of Northern Nigeria now have less rainfall, with increase in temperature, and this has reduced soil moisture. If soil moisture is affected, even with the application of fertiliser, you may not have good harvests.
“The change in temperature and rainfall patterns, especially in Savannah areas of Northern Nigeria, every year is leading to poor agricultural output in these areas.
“The impact of climate change on crop production in Nigeria would have tremendous impact on income, employment and food production,’’ he said.
Musa said that climate change had made it very difficult for farmers and even weather agencies to predict the onset of the rainy season and rainfall patterns in the country, adding that the development had affected crop cultivation timetables across the country.
He commended the Federal Government’s efforts to mitigate the impact of climate change by developing the National Policy on Climate Change and ratifying the 2017 Paris Agreement on Climate Change.
He, however, urged the government at all levels to expedite action on domesticating all international agreements to which Nigeria was a signatory.
The don also called on Nigerians to cultivate the habit of planting trees so as to mitigate the impact of climate change and safeguard the environment for posterity.
NAN recalls that President Muhammadu Buhari on March 28, 2017, signed the instrument ratifying Paris Agreement on Climate Change in Abuja to affirm Nigeria’s commitment to the global efforts to tackle the effects of climate change.
